


Gamgee Gardens

by beetle



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types, The Lord of the Rings - All Media Types
Genre: Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, M/M, Modern Era
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2014-11-30
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-02-27 14:51:12
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 6,663
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2696984
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/beetle/pseuds/beetle
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Kili Durin’s heart-broken, and makes questionable choices on a near-nightly basis. Enter the affluent Baggins family's florist and gardener. Inspired by and a follow-up to BadSkippy’s fandamntastic Bilbo/Thorin fic, Random Thoughts (http://archiveofourown.org/works/2369507).</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. One

**Author's Note:**

  * For [badskippy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/badskippy/gifts).
  * Inspired by [Random Thoughts](https://archiveofourown.org/works/2369507) by [badskippy](https://archiveofourown.org/users/badskippy/pseuds/badskippy). 



> Notes/Warnings: None.

Kili opened his eyes and rolled over, away from the familiar warbling of his mobile, and encountered a stranger in his bed.  
  
This not being an unusual occurrence of late, Kili sighed as last night’s questionable choice wrapped strong arms around him and  _hmm_ ed.  
  
“Gonna get that?” A low voice murmured as lips kissed his temple. Kili, still half-asleep and in no mood for forced phone chat—a quick peek over the questionable choice’s muscled shoulder showed it was almost noon, and far too early to be fielding phone calls from his well-meaning, but utterly clueless uncles—let himself be rolled back over, till he was looking up at the latest handsome face and well-muscled body that’d seemed like a good idea the night before. Said handsome face leaned down to kiss him without waiting for an answer.  
  
“Probably not,” Kili managed to get out between kisses that tasted like toothpaste, which meant that last night’s questionable choice—Brendan? Brandon? Who could keep track?—had not only stayed past his  _Best used by_  date, but had used Kili’s toothbrush.  
  
“Good,” Brendan-Brandon purred in the sudden silence as Kili’s mobile stopped ringing. He pushed Kili’s legs up and out and settled between them. He was more than half-hard and clearly planning to do something about it. “Because I could do with a bit of hair of the dog.”  
  
“You romantical bastard, you.” Kili snorted and let himself be arranged to Brendan-Brandon’s liking, before the larger man—and  _there_  was a feat, for Kili was no compact guy, himself—began to prepare him with the same over-eager and rushed fingering Kili remembered from last night . . . and no lube.  
  
Sighing again, Kili fumbled about on his night-table for the tube of  _Secret Sin_  he habitually left there, and knocked over an open pack of Maltesers before he got the lube. Then he was waggling it at Brendan-Brandon, who looked puzzled.  
  
“But you’re still slick from last night,” the questionable choice said, his handsome brow furrowing in a way that made him look less than bright.  
  
“Not slick enough, Brendan,” Kili informed the guy, purposely slurring and muffling the name just in case it  _was_  Brandon.  
  
Brendan pouted and had the nerve to look hurt. “My name’s not Brennan. It’s Connor.”  
  
Kili colored, but shrugged. “And  _my_  name isn’t  _Kevin,_ ” he said pointedly, referring to the name Connor had called out when he was coming the night before. Both times.  
  
Now Connor looked puzzled again, his guileless blue eyes as empty as his head. “It isn’t?”

  
Last night those eyes had reminded Kili more than a little of another pair of stunning blue eyes that were without guile . . . yet now, in the sober light of morning, Kili was utterly baffled at how he'd made that comparison.  
  
_I suppose that goes to show what most of a bottle of Lagavullin can do to one's brain. . . ._  
  
And being reminded of the very pair of eyes he'd have liked nothing better than to forget, reminded Kili of something else, too. He couldn't lie about in bed _this_ Sunday, until afternoon tea. He had somewhere to be. Somewhere important. And he'd never be forgiven if he missed this _particular_ appointment.  
  


Sighing for a third time, Kili dropped the lube, de-arranged himself, and sat up, occasioning and: “Oi! What’s this, then?”

  
“I’ve got a, erm, business meeting in . . . soon,” Kili lied flatly as he got out of bed, stretching. The brief pops and cracks were more satisfying than last night had been, at any rate, despite the Maltesers underfoot.   
  
“But—it’s Sunday,” Connor announced plaintively. Kili’s back went up.  
  
“I do my best work on Sunday. That’s why they schedule me for today, don’tcha know?” he gritted out, then forced away his tension. He hated this part. The part where they never got the hint and had to be practically tossed out into the street before they realized their presence was no longer welcome. “What say we finish this another time?”  _Like never_.  
  
“ Erm . . . but—” Connor began uncertainly, sounding very lost and very young. Kili turned to the other young man, a bright, but meaningless smile on his face.  
  
“And I’m sure  _you’ve_  got important places to be and important things to do, so I won’t keep you any longer.” He ignored the hungry, beginning to be regretful look on Connor’s handsome—but in morning’s light, quite bland—face, and scratched his chest. “Last night was fun, and I’ll catch ya on the flip-side, right?”  
  
“Er . . . right?”  
  
“Excellent!” Kili winked, turning on the charm like flipping a switch. “You don’t need me to call you a taxi, do you?”  
  
“Er . . . no?”  
  
“Alright, then. Thanks for last night and have a great day.”  
  
“Right,” Connor said slowly, finally getting the hint—and sooner than Kili would’ve expected, but not as soon as he would have liked. But as he stood up and began to gather his clothes from off the floor, he glanced hopefully at Kili again. “Don’t suppose you need someone to scrub your back?”  
  
This was asked with a leer that might have passed for suavity with someone a little thicker than Kili. Or a little drunker. Say the Kili of last night, perhaps.  
  
On his way to the bathroom, Kili tossed back over his shoulder. “Nah. Got a back-scrubby thing for that, but thanks for your concern. Cheers, mate.”  
  
A second later, Kili was in the bathroom, leaning on the thankfully shut door between himself and last night’s questionable choice. When he imagined what his uncles would say about this latest in a string of the same—what  _Fili_  would say . . . or the way Frodo would give him that look of concern and compassion, leavened with guilt—Kili met his dark eyes in the mirror.  
  
At least for a few moments, anyway. Then he was closing them, obscurely thankful that today, of all days, his family would be too busy with other matters to take him to task over his choices of bed-partner.  
  
On the backs of his eyelids, as happened frequently, Kili saw Frodo smiling at him, those striking blue eyes so direct and happy . . . then they darted past Kili, and Frodo’s eyes and face practically lit up as he saw Fili. As ever they had, since . . . as far back as Kili could remember.  
  
Not that he chose to remember back far. It hurt too much to think that, in the lottery of life, he’d lost everything at such an early age. And that he’d lost it to none other than the older brother whom he loved more than anyone.  
  
Fili, who’d never harmed a fly and would’ve, if he could’ve, stepped back and let Kili have their cousin . . . if said cousin had not made it irrefutably clear at last which brother he preferred . . . to none more than he had Kili.   
  
_”But I _love__  you, Frodo Baggins!” Kili had said that awful night, standing in the rain, soaked. Just as Frodo was soaked, his dark curls plastered to his head as he looked down at his feet for a few moments, before looking back up at Kili with such compassion, such empathy, such . . . distance. A distance Kili had finally understood would never be crossed. He and Frodo would never meet in the middle of that vast gulf. Nor at any point along the way.  
  
“I love you, too, Kili, just . . . not in that _way. I’m . . . I’m sorry.” Frodo had whispered with the brave forthrightness that Kili had always at turns admired and despised. “I hope you won’t hate me for this. That we’ll always be friends—”_  
  
“I have _friends, Frodo. And I’m not in love with any of them. You and I will_ never _be just friends,” Kili had said, reaching out to tip Frodo’ face up to his own as he stepped closer . . . till they had been sharing air. Till Kili’s lips had been brushing Frodo’s warm wet ones, his tongue darting out to coax that full, sweet mouth open. To let Kili in._  
  
_But they hadn’t._  
  
_They never would._  
  
_“Kili, don’t,” Frodo had breathed, shivering in the_ chill damp _, but resisting when Kili tried to wrap his arms around him._  
  
_“Why not?” Kili had asked, shivering himself at Frodo’s nearness, at the lingering sweetness on his lips, like candy canes and chocolate, because Frodo had a fondness and_ weakness _for sweets, but never so much as he did during Yuletime._  
  
_“Because I’m_ . _. . I’m already in love with someone. Someone I have absolutely no chance with, but for whom I would wait forever for some sign, no matter how small, that my feelings could be returned. It wouldn’t be fair of me to embark on anything with you when this other person has always had my heart and always will,” Frodo had sighed, then stepped back decisively from Kili, who felt those last words like a hammer-blow to the heart._  
  
_Because he’d already known with whom his cousin was in love. Had known since they were_ wee _, from the way Frodo’s eyes seemed to glow when he looked at_ Fili _. Had known and tried to blind himself to the fact that his feelings, his plight, was hopeless, and had been from the moment Frodo and Fili had met._  
  
_And despite the fact that_ Fili _had always stayed in the background, as a steady, big brother to them both, Kili knew his brother better than Fili knew himself. It’d taken years, but in time,_ FIli _had grown to return_ Frodo’s feelings _. At this late date, the only people who didn’t know how Frodo and Fili had felt for each other_ . _. ._ were _Frodo and Fili._  
  
_And a willfully blind Kili._  
  
_But no more. . . ._  
  
_Now, he’d looked away from the plea for understanding in Frodo’s big blue eyes. “Have you told him? Have you told_ Fili _you love him?” Kili had asked, though he’d already known the answer was no._  
  
_Surprised, Frodo had blinked. “You—how did you know it was Fili?” He didn’t bother to deny it, something which made Kili obscurely proud, even as he_ wilted _inside._  
  
_“How could I not?” He swallowed, searching Frodo’s clear eyes. “No matter how much I lied to myself and told myself that one day you’d love me the way you loved him_ . _. ._ how _could I not_ know _, Frodo? You_ shine _when you’re around him . . . you_ simply shine _. In light of that, how could I not know?”_  
  
_Frodo blushed, burying his face in his hands. “Oh, God, does Fili_ know _?”_  
  
_Kili had laughed ruefully. “Of course not, or you wouldn’t be standing here, wasting time with_ me _, would you? You’d be in_ his  _arms, right now, and he’d be the happiest man alive.”_  
  
_“He’d have to feel the same way for me for that to happen, Kili, and he doesn’t,” Frodo had said so_ hopelessly _that it was like a second hammer-blow to Kili’s heart. One that eclipsed his rage and jealousy and hurt. Frodo in pain was something he’d never stand for, no matter how things went between them. “He’ll never see me in that way.”_  
  
Kili’d _gaped. “Are you fucking joking?” he’d demanded incredulously. “Frodo, if you tell Fili how you feel, I guarantee you that you will find a warm welcome.”_  
  
_Frodo had sighed. “Why? What would he want with his scrawny little_ tag-along _cousin? He could have anyone he wanted. Why would he want_ me _?”_  
  
_Kili had snorted again and shook his head. “Have you looked in a mirror, lately?”_  
  
_Frodo had blushed again, hotly. “_ Kili— _”_  
  
_“Anyway, he feels the same for you, you know?” Kili had said stiffly, though his voice was light and casual. “Has done for some time.”_  
  
_Frodo had frowned, but his eyes had had a hopeful light in them. “But—he_ can’t _—he never said anything—”_  
  
_“And he never will. Not unless he thinks I have no chance with you,” Kili’d said, turning away and looking up into the rainy night sky. “And clearly I don’t.”_  
  
_“Kili, please_ . _. ._ don’t _. . . .”_  
  
_“You’d better go to him, yeah? In the interests of not wasting more time?”_  
  
_“But, Kili. . . .” Frodo trailed off because Kili was already walking away, the only difference between the rain on his cheeks and his own traitorous tears being the slight difference in temperature. . . ._  
  
That night, Kili had made his first questionable choice—the first in a string of many—and in the months since then had done his best to steer clear of both Frodo and Fili, who’d become inseparable in the intervening time. In fact, he didn’t see his cousin and brother at all, except for the occasional Sunday teas at Bag End. And when he  _did_ see them . . . their happiness scalded and scorched his heart—made it into a dead pile of soot and ashes, rather than a living, beating organ.  
  
And yet for all that, he did not begrudge them their happiness. At least, he didn’t begrudge them if he didn’t have to  _see_  them constantly, and have his face rubbed in how perfect they were for each other.  
  
Even one or two Sunday teas a month were almost more than Kili could bear. And today. . . ? Today was shaping up to be beyond unbearable.  
  
Now, as he regarded his reflection once more, he tried on a smile that definitely didn’t pass muster.  
  
“You’ve gotta stop doing this, Kil,” he muttered, shaking his head. “It’s not solving anything, and it’s only making you despair of yourself. You've got to pull it together, if only for today. If only for the wedding. You can't let your misery and being a sore loser ruin their happy day, right?”  
  
His reflection had no reply but a sheepish, guilty look that quickly sidled away.  
  
With yet another sigh, Kili shook his head and made his way to the shower, though it never made him feel refreshed or even clean anymore.  
  
As he showered, he kept an ear out for Connor leaving. When he heard the door to the flat slam shut—an offended sort of slam, if it was anything—he finally relaxed under the hot water, and set about trying to wash last night—and all the nights before them—away. He couldn't be his usual scruffy mess, today.  


In two hours, he had to play best man for his rival.

  
For his brother.

 

TBC


	2. Two

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Kili Durin’s heart-broken, and makes questionable choices on a near-nightly basis. Enter the affluent Baggins family's florist and gardener. Inspired by and a follow-up to BadSkippy’s fandamntastic Bilbo/Thorin fic, Random Thoughts.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Notes/Warnings: None.

“I wasn’t certain you were going to make it. . . .”  
  
Kili hurried into the small antechamber of the church and barely paused to give his worried uncle a kiss on the crown of his head before striding to the uncomfortable-looking settee whereon a lone garment bag was draped. “Of course, I made it, Uncle Bilbo. I wouldn’t miss my own brother’s wedding for the world.”  
  
“Hmm,” Uncle Bilbo said, his voice as worried as his face. But he politely turned his back as Kili hustled out of his street-clothes and into the tuxedo—chosen by none other than Uncle Bilbo, as Kili, it was widely-known, had awful taste in clothing—waiting in the garment bag. “What kept you in the first place? Overslept?”  
  
“Sort of . . . bloody cravat. . . .”  
  
“Save it till last, and I’ll fix it for you.”  
  
“Thanks, uncle.”  
  
“You’re quite welcome, love . . . so, did this oversleeping have anything to do with the reason why your Uncle Thorin and I couldn’t reach you last night or this morning?”  
  
Kili blushed, thinking of the reason he’d been unreachable the night before, so to speak. But he couldn’t very well tell Uncle Bilbo he’d been busy with his legs over some bloke’s shoulders, getting his arse pounded like a Salvation Army drum.  
  
No, he sensed that wouldn’t go over well. Not at all.  
  
“No, I was just . . . tired. You know me: I’m rubbish without my fifteen hours of sleep,” Kili joked, untucking his hair from the collar of his fancy shirt. Usually he kept the mess shoulder-length, but lately, he couldn’t be arsed to do anything about it, and it now hung almost to the middle of his back. Which was sort of inconvenient, when dressing. “Bloody hair.”  
  
“You know, you really ought to cut it shorter. You’re far too handsome a young man to have all that hair hiding your face,” Uncle Bilbo noted from over by the window, out of which he was peering. It was, despite Kili’s sour, maudlin mood, a gorgeous, sunny day, of the kind one doesn’t see too often in London or environs. But for Kili, because of the aforementioned mood—because his true love was marrying another, and Kili wasn’t even allowed to be upset because that other was his bloody  _brother_ —the day held no joy or wonder whatsoever. It and its oppressive cheerfulness were only heralds of the long life ahead of him without the one thing that made living worth it.  
  
Sighing, Kili zipped his fly after tucking in his shirt. Then he shrugged on his vest, buttoned it, and said: “Okay, uncle, I’m decent.”  
  
“Well, I wouldn’t go  _that_  far,” Uncle Bilbo quipped, but immediately turned ‘round and strode over to Kili. He stopped in front of his nephew, smiling his kind, understanding smile. He barely came up to Kili’s shoulder, but nonetheless, since before Kili had come up to  _Uncle Bilbo’s_  shoulder, he’d looked up to his Uncle Thorin’s husband. And he’d always hoped that like Uncle Thorin, he’d someday find his own Bilbo—had thought he’d found someone just as wonderful, if not better. But he’d been wrong. Not about Frodo’s wonderfulness, but that Frodo had been his. . . .  
  
How wrong he’d been!  
  
Frodo had never been anyone’s but Fili’s.  
  
“It’ll be alright,” Uncle Bilbo said suddenly, gently, as he adjusted Kili’s seemingly hopeless cravat, the way he’d no doubt fixed Uncle Thorin’s since the man was as hopeless at his neckwear as Kili was. “Oh, Kili-love, I promise, it’ll get better. And someday, you won’t even remember what it feels like to hurt so much.”  
  
Blinking back tears he hadn’t even realized were in the works, Kili turned on his most charming smile. “I don’t know what you’re talking about, uncle. I’m fine.”  
  
As he put the finishing touches on Kili’s cravat, Bilbo bent him a disbelieving look. Kili laughed rather limply and kissed his uncle on the cheek. “Thanks for the help with this bloody thing.”  
  
“You’re welcome, love.” Bilbo searched Kili’s eyes so piercingly and for so long, Kili flushed and looked away. “Oh, my  _dear_.”  
  
Then Bilbo was embracing him tight, in that way he’d had since Kili was a child. The way that made Kili feel both small and safe and always would, despite the fact that Bilbo was such a wee man in comparison to himself.  
  
Kili bent and returned the embrace, eyes closed, lest those traitor-tears slip out.  
  
“Don’t give up, Kili Durin. You’re a fine man, kind and smart, handsome and brave. The right one is out there, waiting for you,” Bilbo whispered in his ear, and Kili snorted.  
  
“Yes, I know he is. And he’s about to be married to my brother,” came out without Kili’s permission, and he clamped a hand over his mouth instantly, mortified.  
  
“That means that he isn’t the right one,” Bilbo said simply, certainly, and Kili laughed again, though this time it sounded more like a sob.  
  
“Then why does it hurt so much, uncle?” Another reply slipped out without Kili’s say-so, but this time, he was too busy fighting the tears and pain that threatened to swamp him, to be mortified.  
  
“Because you loved truly, dearest. Whether or not Frodo was the one, you still loved him truly, with all your heart. That is, I’ve found, the way Durin men love.” Bilbo chuckled. “You loved him, and have done for over half your life. That sort of feeling, whether or not it’s requited, leaves deep footprints in the heart, ones that will never be fully filled-in but will, in time, be eclipsed. It hurts,” he said, leaning back to look at Kili, who was shocked to see tears in his uncle’s eyes, too, “because it was real, your love.”  
  
Kili shook his head and looked down, in a vain attempt to hide his own teary, reddened eyes and nose. “If this is real love, uncle, I don’t want it,” he said softly, in a voice that cracked. “Take it away from me.”  
  
“I can’t,” Bilbo replied, reaching up to cup Kili’s stubbly cheek. “Nothing can.”  
  
“Then what am I to  _do_?” Kili shook his head again, wiping his wet face and sniffling. “It hurts too much to go on. And I can’t even be happy for my own brother and cousin on their wedding day because it feels like I’ve been robbed. As if I’m watching the life that should’ve been mine pass me by.”  
  
“Oh, my poor Kili.” With another embrace, this one quick and hard, Bilbo cupped Kili’s face in his hands and looked his nephew in the eyes. “You’ll have the life you want someday. This, I promise. You’ll have all the love and comfort and security you seek now, only it will be with the person who’s  _right_  for you.”  
  
Frodo  _was right for me!_  Kili wailed to himself, wounded, and cringing from the feeling. But aloud, he said: “How do you  _know_ , Uncle Bilbo?”  
  
Bilbo smiled again, sniffling himself. “Oh, love, because I have a gift for you,” he whispered, letting go of Kili to pat himself down. “One I think you’ll be able to appreciate.”  
  
Frowning, Kili watched as his uncle continued to search his pockets before exclaiming: “Aha!” and removing something from his right waistcoat pocket.  
  
Kili’s eyes widened.

 

 

 

 

*

  
  
The ceremony went off without a hitch.  
  
It was, in a word,  _beautiful_ , even Kili—who played his part of best man very well—could appreciate that. Though he had eyes for no one and nothing but Frodo Baggins-Durin.  
  
He looked lovely in his white and silver tuxedo—a perfect match for Fili’s black and silver tuxedo. Throughout the ceremony the couple held hands and looked nowhere but at each other. Their love was so evident, so strong, so bloody  _pure_ , even Kili felt humbled by it, and a little in awe of it. . . .  
  
Even as it all drove home the inescapable fact that Frodo had  _never_  been his. Had never been  _right_  for him. Not if he could turn such a look of love and wonder on Kili’s brother as if no one else in the world existed, and never would.  
  
By the time the ceremony was over and the newly-wedded couple shared their first kiss as such, Kili felt as if he’d been gutted.  
  
For despite what Uncle Bilbo had said, his love  _wasn’t_  real, never had been. Without its mirror, its reciprocal, a man’s love wasn’t real. It was just wishful thinking mixed with a certain willful blindness and selfish vanity.  
  
And what else could it be, to think that anyone with their druthers and in their right mind would choose him over  _Fili_? Fili was the older, smarter, better-looking brother, and when all was said and done, he was also the more giving, the more  _kind_  brother, for all that. Humble and self-effacing. The only thing Kili’d ever had Fili beat at was height, footballing, and a middling talent for music, which was hardly as impressive as Fili’s many scholastic achievements and his tendency to do good deeds simply for their own sake and because they wanted doing.  
  
Fili had, for his whole life, always given up things he’d wanted so that Kili could have what  _he_  wanted. He’d even been willing to give up Frodo, when he’d thought Frodo wanted Kili back. Fili would have been miserable for the rest of his life if it meant that  _Kili_  would be happy.  
  
Could Kili have honestly done the same, even for his beloved big brother?  
  
As he watched the blissful couple hurry down the church steps in a shower of rice and flowers and, laughing, pile into their limousine to the reception hall, Kili knew he honestly could  _not_  have done the same. And  _would_  not have, even if he  _could_  have.  
  
 _And that,_  he thought as the limousine pulled out into traffic, and he waved and grinned along with everyone else,  _is why Fili won Frodo. Because he was, ironically,_ _the_ best man.  
  
 _I’m just the also-ran._  
  
Kili sighed, then started when a strong arm went around his shoulder, immediately followed by a gentle one around his waist.  
  
“You did a good job today, Kili,” Uncle Thorin murmured, his eyes following the limousine’s progress till it turned the corner. Then he glanced at Kili and smiled so understandingly, Kili wondered if he’d been practicing smiles with Uncle Bilbo. “A fine job. A better best man isn’t to be found in this hemisphere.”  
  
“I quite agree,” Uncle Bilbo added, squeezing Kili’s waist and leaning against him briefly.  
  
Kili snorted. “Don’t let Uncle Dwalin or Uncle Ori hear you two say that. After all, at least they got to throw you bachelor parties. Fili didn’t even  _want_  one,” he groused, thinking that despite everything, he might have liked to share Fili’s last night of bachelorhood pub-crawling and reminiscing and just  _being brothers_  in a way they hadn’t been for the past few months.  
  
The past few  _years_ , really.  
  
Instead, Fili had chosen to spend his last night of freedom with Frodo, as he’d spent every night since their first together.  
  
And when it came down to it, Kili couldn’t really blame Fili. After all, if given the choice—which Fili had been—of spending a night with his surly, jealous, bitter little brother, or his sweet, beautiful, indescribably sexy fiancé . . . who would chose Kili?  
  
Even  _Kili_  wouldn’t have chosen Kili.  
  
The only people who seemed to choose Kili, in fact, were people like Brendan-Connor, or others of his ilk. Flash, shallow blokes on the prowl for another notch on their tasteful belts. And for some reason, Kili, who was at best scruffy, on most days, seemed to be just what the doctor ordered.  
  
He wasn’t, Kili supposed, as actor-handsome as Fili, or as heroically handsome as Uncle Thorin—no, nor burly-handsome like Uncle Dwalin, or twink-sexy like Uncles Bilbo and Ori—but he had some quality that made random blokes, and not just a few of them, want to shag him silly.  
  
And some of them had even pushed for a more permanent, steady thing—friends-with-benefits, Kili imagined—though he’d wanted no part of that or of them, save their pricks and/or arseholes for the duration of a night. When morning rolled around, as it always did, the only person he loathed more than his bedmates was himself. Hardly the promising start such a relationship recommended. . . .  
  
“Ah, yes . . . Dwalin  _did_  throw a . . . memorable bachelor party,” Uncle Thorin mused fondly, his eyes taking on a far-away look. For all of three seconds before that look disappeared with a guilty yelp, and Thorin let go of Kili to rub his own shoulder.  
  
“Yes, I’d heard from Balin just how  _memorable_  Dwalin’s little soiree was, Thorin Durin, and let me just tell  _you_ , you’re lucky I still married you at all!” Uncle Bilbo huffed, giving his husband a narrow-eyed glare. Uncle Thorin’s smile was sheepish and apologetic.  
  
“Yes. I tell myself every day how lucky I am, my love,” he said without irony or sarcasm. “Even when you pinch me hard enough to cause blood-clots.”  
  
“Well,” Bilbo huffed again, crossing his arms. “It’s no less than you deserve.”  
  
Grinning, now, his own worries momentarily forgotten, Kili asked, glancing from uncle to uncle: “What happened at Uncle Thorin’s bachelor party?”  
  
“Never you mind,” both uncles said at once, one gruff and the other scandalized. Then Uncle Bilbo smiled smugly. “Fili has more common sense at twenty-six than  _you did_ at thirty-six, Thorin.”  
  
“I won’t debate that,” Uncle Thorin agreed mildly. “He got that common sense from Vili’s side of the family.”  
  
“I like to think  _I_  contributed a  _little_  to my own son’s common sense. Not to mention his excellent taste in men,” a woman’s smooth, amused voice said, and Kili turned to see Mum and Auntie Bella approaching, arm in arm, each carrying their purses and a handful of flowers. They both looked lovely in their dresses: the former in an understated light blue sheath and matching hat, the latter in a strapless pastel floral print that cinched just below the bustline.  
  
“You were a wonderful best man, love,” Mum said, letting go of Auntie Bella to hug Kili and buss his cheek. “I’m so proud of you!”  
  
“Thanks, Mum.” Kili tried on a smile that was mostly real. He couldn’t help it. His mother’s praise always made him glow, even if he hadn’t really done much to earn it.  
  
“And you looked so handsome and grown-up! You may not have got the lion’s share of your father’s common sense, but you got the Durin charm and looks to make up for it,” Mum said, winking at him when Uncle Bilbo and Uncle Thorin both looked sheepish.  
  
“No, I don’t suppose the Durin family was ever known for its . . . level-headedness, shall we say?” Uncle Thorin chuckled, still blushing and casting a glance and Uncle Bilbo, who also colored. “But say what you will about our branch of the family, we’re still head and shoulders above Dain and his kin when it comes to common sense.”  
  
“Oh, don’t let’s get started on  _Dain_ , shall we?” Uncle Bilbo pleaded, and everyone laughed. It was widely-known that Bilbo Baggins didn’t entirely approve of Thorin and Dwalin’s hard-drinking, fist-swinging, womanizing cousin. Though said disapproval had decidedly worsened after Uncle Thorin and Uncle Bilbo got married.  
  
 _Directly_  after.  
  
And Uncle Dain  _had_  been invited to the bachelor party no one wanted to discuss. . . .  
  
 _There’s a tale there, worth telling. If I can get someone to actually_ tell _me,_  Kili mused gleefully, and immediately knew just whom to ask.  
  
After all, it’d been ages since he’d spoken with Uncle Dain—just  _ages_. The flame-haired, whisky-swilling bear of a man hadn’t been able to make it to the wedding, but he’d sent his regrets and a rather large wedding gift.  
  
No doubt he’d want to hear all the details of the day. And who better to share them than Kili, who’d had a front-row seat? And if Uncle Dain should get to talking about a certain bachelor party. . . .  
  
“ _You_  look like the cat that ate the canary, just now,” Uncle Bilbo said, searching Kili’s face. “What’s that wicked little smile for?”  
  
“What? Oh, that’s nothing—nothing. Just thinking about a thing that had happened the other day at practice,” Kili lied with as much innocence as he could slather on with such short notice. “It’s a musician-thing . . . you wouldn’t understand. Treble clefs and bass clefs and the like. Tra-la-la—”  
  
Kili quickly shut his mouth before he could babble any more inanities, and give himself away (he was a piss-poor liar, like every Durin before him). Uncle Bilbo gave him a suspicious look, but when Kili held his innocent-face for most of a half-minute, Uncle Bilbo huffed for a third time, and turned to Mum and Auntie Bella.  
  
“C’mon, Kil,” Uncle Thorin said, slinging an arm around Kili’s shoulders and turning them toward the sidewalk. He jingled his key-ring and tossed it in the air, grinning when Kili caught it. “Let’s bring the car ‘round so we can get to the reception hall before Fili and Frodo eat all the wedding cake.”  
  
“Right.” Kili laughed as they jogged down the steps and made for the church car-park. “Not that Frodo’ll need  _Fili’s_  help eating a whole cake.”  
  
“True.” Uncle Thorin chuckled. “I swear that boy has a hollow leg—there’s no place else he could be putting all the food he eats, and still be almost skinny enough to look through.”  
  
“Yeah.” Kili smiled fondly, thinking of all the times he’d used to tease Frodo for eating so much and still being so small. In truth, that teasing had done more to cover Kili’s desire for his cousin, than anything else. His yearning to cover that compact body in kisses and love-marks. To hold it in his arms and never let it go. . . .   
  
As they spotted Uncle Thorin’s midnight-blue Volvo SUV, Kili heaved a sigh. He’d never, as long as he lived, know the taste of Frodo’s skin, now, or the sounds he made when he was being loved with care and intensity. Never again taste the sweetness of that perfect mouth. Never have the one person with whom it seemed he’d  _finally_ started to make sense to himself. . . .  
  
When the car was unlocked, Kili climbed in—since he was little, whenever he got the chance, he always rode shotgun with Uncle Thorin—and rolled down the window. Thorin started the car, but then sat there for a minute, without pulling out of the parking spot.  
  
When Kili looked up, it was to see his uncle watching him in the rearview with grim, worried eyes.  
  
“Are you alright, Kili?”  
  
Laughing, Kili looked away. “Of course, I am. Why wouldn’t I be?”  
  
He could sense his uncle’s frown without even seeing it. And he could even sense when Uncle Thorin opened his mouth to speak. But for a while, Thorin was silent, still.  
  
“If ever you wish to talk about it,” he finally began, and Kili shook his head.  
  
“I can assure you: I won’t.”  
  
“But if ever you  _do_  . . . your uncle and I are here for you. We love you, and want only for you to be happy.”  
  
“Thank you, uncle, but I’m afraid that particular train has sailed.” Kili glanced at Uncle Thorin, then away from the compassion in those dark blue, normally stern eyes. “Don’t worry about me. I’ll be fine. Aren’t I always?”  
  
“I don’t know about  _that_ ,” Uncle Thorin rumbled quietly. “But I  _do_  know what it’s like to see what you think is your only chance at true love leave with another. I know the feeling of having love blaze so hot . . . only to turn your heart to ash in its wake.”  
  
Kili frowned. Though it was unlikely his uncle hadn’t loved anyone but Uncle Bilbo, Kili couldn’t remember his uncle  _being with_  anyone except Uncle Bilbo. Before him, there’d been . . . no one. Not a single—  
  
“Mr. Oropherilon,” Kili said doubtfully, frowning as he tried to call forth the memory attached with that name. Mostly he remembered a tall, forbidding man with platinum hair and a regal, condescending manner. “Are you—were you—is he the one you’re speaking of, Uncle?”  
  
Uncle Thorin blinked, startled. “How—how do you remember him? You were so young when he and I were seeing each other—only four, and I didn’t bring him ‘round more than a handful of times. . . .”  
  
Smiling sadly, Kili shrugged and looked down at his hands for a moment. “I don’t remember much  _about_  him. Only that I didn’t like him or his son—Leg . . . Legolon, or something, right?”  
  
“Legolas, and yes . . . Legolas was fifteen, and shaping up to be exactly like his father, unfortunately,” Uncle Thorin murmured, smiling to himself, also sadly. “And as for you not liking them, that was made quite apparent when you announced, to all and sundry, that you didn’t like  _Mister Orphanarium_  and kicked him in the shin!”  
  
Kili burst out laughing. “I didn’t!”  
  
“You  _did_!” Uncle Thorin started laughing, too. “You  _never_  liked Thranduil from the moment he called you  _Killian_ , thinking that’s what Kili was short for.” Snorting, Uncle Thorin shifted the car into drive.  
  
“Huh,” Kili said. Then his brow furrowed as he remembered something else. “And there was a little girl, too, wasn’t there? A little red-haired girl? Legolon’s sister?”  
  
“Adopted sister. Tauriel.” Uncle Thorin frowned. “She was a sweet little thing. Worshipped the ground Thranduil walked on. Wanted to be just like him when she grew up.”  
  
“Ugh.” Kili rolled his eyes, recalling green eyes like the moss on a stone near a deep pool, and a smile that’d fascinated him at the ripe old age of four. She’d been a  _big girl_ of nine or ten, from what he remembered. “Be a shame if she got her wish. She was the only one of them I liked.”  
  
“Yes, I do recall that, myself. At any rate, I bring this up only to say that . . . when I was a few years older than FIli, I thought that Thranduil was the love of my life. My future. I overlooked his  _mountains_  of flaws and . . . quirks, because I was certain I’d never find anyone else who could love me half as much as I thought he did. And then. . . .”  
  
“Then?”  
  
“Then . . . he did me the biggest favor of my life and dumped me for a richer, older gentleman. Saruman White.”  
  
Kili goggled. “ _The_  Saruman White?!  _Lord Istari_ , Saruman White?!”  
  
Uncle Thorin nodded. “The one and only. More money than God and the power to back it up. He was a much better catch than I was, in Thranduil’s eyes. As far as I know, White and Thranduil are still together. Birds of a feather, and all that—though, in their case, it’s more like snakes of a scale.” Uncle Thorin huffed just like Uncle Bilbo had. “But if he hadn’t . . . traded up, I’d never have met your Uncle Bilbo. Or if I had, I’d have been in no state to pursue him. Do you take my meaning Kili?” he glanced at Kili as he pulled out of the car-park and onto the street. “Thranduil broke my heart, but in the end, he did me a greater favor than anyone ever has. He let me be free to find the one I was meant to be with.  
  
“Just as you’ve been freed to find the one with whom  _you_  are meant to be.”  
  
Kili shook his head in negation. “I think Frodo  _was_  the one, Uncle.”  
  
“Did you hear his voice in your head once, today?”  
  
Kili didn’t even pretend not to know what Uncle Thorin was alluding to. They both knew that  _Uncle Thorin_  knew Uncle Bilbo had given Kili the stone. “Not once,” Kili admitted lowly.  
  
“Then it’s not meant to be.”  
  
Scoffing, Kili almost ripped the bloody necklace from around his neck. “Because some silly, old superstition doesn’t decree it?”  
  
“Because Frodo doesn’t hear you, either, Kili. But he  _does_  hear Fili.” Uncle Thorin’s eyes met Kili’s in the rearview mirror, and Kili opened his mouth to rebut that . . . but found that there was no way to.  
  
He slumped in the passenger seat, and put his hand over his chest. Over the stone.  
  
“What if I don’t  _want_  to love anyone but Frodo. What if I don’t want  _anyone_  else?” he asked, and Uncle Thorin barked a commiserating laugh.  
  
“I doubt the stone will give you much choice! One day, maybe soon, you’ll hear a voice in your head, and that’ll be all she wrote. I’m not saying this person will be perfect . . . but they’ll be perfect for  _you_. Better than anyone that came before. And more importantly, they’ll be  _right_  for you.” Uncle Thorin’s hand settled on Kili’s shoulder for a few moments, squeezing. Then he was pulling into the standing zone in front of the church and Uncle Bilbo, Mum, and Auntie Bella were piling in, chattering about the lovely flower displays. How they couldn’t wait to see the set-up at the reception hall.  
  
“That Gamgee fellow is a miracle worker with flowers,” Mum was saying, and Auntie Bella laughed.  
  
“Oh, my,  _yes_. The Baggins family has been friends with the Gamgees for generations. As far back as the name goes, they’ve all been gardeners and florists. It’s in their blood.”  
  
“Well, it certainly shows! I know where I’ll be getting my fresh flowers from, in future!”  
  
The two women and Bilbo chattered on about the floral displays and flowers in general. Kili sighed and tuned his family out for the rest of the drive to the hall, his mind on the seemingly capricious nature of the stone resting over his empty, broken heart.

 

 

 

 

TBC


End file.
